Strange Scaffold doesn't stop cookin'.
2024 saw the release of Life Eater, Clickolding, I Am Your Beast (and DLC), and El Paso, Elsewhere on iOS. And without missing a beat, Strange Scaffold's 2025 is starting with two decently lengthy looks at a duo of games that, stop me if you've heard it before, no one else in the industry is really making right now.
Let's take a quick look at the matchroidvania stylings of Creepy Redneck Dinosaur Mansion 3 and the turtle-y beat-em-up turned turtle-y turn-based tactics game that is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Tactical Takedown.
Genre: Match-3 Metroidvania survival horror comedy RPG???
Platform: PC
Release Date: April 2025
Creepy Redneck Dinosaur Mansion III is everything and nothing that you'd expect, even if you read this entire article. It's a match-3 game. It's a choose-your-own-adventure RPG. It's a Metroidvania. It's a Resident Evil parody. It's a meta experience about game development.
It's Strange Scaffold.
In this game, you suit up as recent Postal Inspection Service transfer J.J. Hardwell, your typical rookie on his first day, shoved into a situation he can't really handle. He's an officer of the Department of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Super Science, and he's sent to a mansion to investigate a rogue super scientist: Huncan Dockright III. And even with all that chaos thrust upon him, JJ's also got to worry about dinosaurs wandering about in this old mansion. Yeah, I don't know either. Super Science, I guess?
It all plays out like a silly parody of Resident Evil, with jokes about complicated doorways with embedded puzzles, and strange acronyms for even stranger organizations tossed in for good measure. And all that would have been fun enough on its own, but Strange Scaffold had more than satirizing in mind for this game. CRDM3 reveals its greatest trick halfway through the demo, when J.J. not only realizes he's in a video game but starts to poke at its edges, trying to keep his reality alive amidst the slowly evolving game bugs that threaten its existence.
CRDM3 is actually a game about game development. It's a game about the state of the industry. It's a game that bottles up all those frustrated questions we have about modern game development business decisions and makes you laugh at it all. The demo only shows a glimpse of where the story might go, as J.J. is let loose to "bug fix" the game he's the hero of, but I'm already sold on its humor.
On the gameplay side, CRDM3 utilizes match-3 as its all-in-one conflict resolution tool. J.J.'s path is thwarted by a locked fence? Match-3 to figure out how to get over it. There's a dinosaur to fight? Match-3 to take it down. Gotta defuse a bomb? Match-3!
Like in other match-3 RPGs, you need to match specific symbols to accrue enough in your stock to unlock certain skills and give you the edge in combat. Get three blue diamonds and six knifes? You can use J.J.'s Shoulder Bash to do three damage. Four ruby triangles in your collection? You can heal up a bit.
Combat is fun, but it's how Strange Scaffold stretches this formula to cover all interactions that makes it really interesting. For example, at one point in the demo, you have to identify someone watching you from behind a painting. You make progress in doing so by matching paint brush symbols on your board. But if you match any ruby triangle symbols, you pull that progress back. Later, there's a brontosaurus you need to squeeze past in a narrow hallway: You've got to withstand his crushing wiggling by matching blue diamonds to slowly creep forward.
These little twists on the formula constantly make each match-3 section engaging, and when tied with the choice-driven narrative pieces, it never feels like "just a match-3 game."
As J.J. navigates the mansion, he'll reach the end of branches, where he must loop back to the start of the game and pick a new path forward. In navigating these branches, he unlocks new knowledge and understands new things. It adds an interesting layer of RPG-like progression as his skills change, encouraging you to poke at all possible options. It's here that CRDM3 earns the matchroidvania title, as returning to old stopping points with new skills and knowledge unlocks horrifying new sights and entire new branches to discover... like the Clown Alley. Don't talk to me about the Clown Alley...
CRDM3 is an ambitiously weird title that, at its core, is just damn fun to play with. The match-3 is satisfying, the writing is as gut-punchy in its takedowns as it is funny, and it has the funkiest little polka soundtrack you ever did hear. Don't miss this gem-filled gem.
Genre: Turn-based tactics a la Turtles beat-em-up
Platform: PC
Release Date: 2025
Licensed video games are so back. Strange Scaffold's most surprising announcement of the year came right at the end of 2024, when they revealed they were working on, of all things, a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles tactics game. A franchise so defined by fast-moving, arcade-y beat-em-ups is set to slow things down and showcase the strategic side of the Turtles, and I have a lot of feelings about it.
For one, intrigue starts before the game even gets going, as Strange Scaffold has made the bold choice to upset the status quo of the Turtles universe and kick the story off in the wake of both Master Splinter's and Shredder's deaths. The Turtles are reeling, the Foot Clan's got a power vacuum, and the two forces bash against each other once more for control of New York.
It's not as if these characters haven't died before in a TMNT story, and I'm no TMNT lore expert, but as the starting point for a brand new story it feels like a fresh shakeup. No origin stories or rehashing of old Turtles lore here. Strange Scaffold's not going to just rely on winks and nods to usher you through a nostalgic journey.
The next big piece is, of course, the gameplay: This is TMNT's first-ever turn-based game, and Strange Scaffold's, too. (I'll wait however long it takes to meet the baseball ghost from their previously announced tactics game, Teenage Demon Slayer Society, though. Don't get it twisted.) Tactical Takedown looks to replicate what TMNT is known for in the video game space — old-school side scrolling beat-em-ups — but in a turn-based tactics format.
Easy stuff, right?
Strange Scaffold accomplishes this by turning the Turtles and their enemies into action figure-like toys on a grid-based world that reveals itself in chunks, asking you to constantly move forward and keep the pressure advancing as new parts of the world are unveiled and old ones fall into the void.
It's turn-based tactics, sure. But you can't take a single turn off. You both have to make sure you're headed in the right direction and thin out the overwhelming crowds of enemies that wait at each turn.
Their interpretation of the format is nostalgic in two ways. First, it perfectly recreates the beloved beat-em-up experience with its endless waves of enemies and giant blinking GO signs appearing in the sky as the level evolves ahead of you. Second, there's a clear appeal to childhood nostalgia in its toy-like aesthetic. Halfway through my my time with the demo, I realized that slowly moving my Turtle around the turn-based grid felt kind of like being a kid telling their own TMNT story: plonking their toys around and putting them in perfect attack poses while they progressively built out new scenes for the Turtles to deal with ahead.
I didn't grow up with the Turtles like so many others did, but I did grow up bashing my toys together in long choreographed fights, and this tactics game brought me back to that place in a way I never expected.
One thing I found most interesting is how TMNT: Tactical Takedown turns the turtle action into a solitary affair. In the beat-em-ups, in the shows, in the movies, I've always seen the Turtles as a unit. But in the demo, I saw one unique Turtle per chapter. Each one plays in the tactical sandbox about the way you'd expect: Michelangelo is all about bouncing around and dealing quick damage. Raphael is the bruiser who can wipe out even the heaviest enemies in one blow. Donatello can take over a map with his tech. And Leonardo is the best of all worlds.
But I kind of missed the Turtles fighting together.
I hope there are some places in the full game where the Turtles come together. Narratively, they seem to have drifted apart, and the game seems to thrive in scenarios where you feel overwhelmed and still manage to pull off the win. But if Strange Scaffold really wants to recreate the beat-em-up experience, having all four Turtles on screen at once is going to be the gold.
Strange Scaffold's Turtles and tactics debut releases later this year. But until then, this Steam Next Fest demo was better than a pipin' hot slice of pizza, dude. COWABUNGA. (Did I do it right, Turtles fans?)
Both of these games come out later this year, and you already know what we're going to say: wishlisting games goes a long way! So, don't let J.J. wander into dino-infested manors on his own and don't let the Turtles down, y'hear?!
Want more on upcoming games? Check out our Steam Next Fest coverage and mini-previews.
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